Other research has suggested that individuals who use cannabis first and then transition onto licit drug use are less likely to use harder substances than those who use licit drugs before transitioning to cannabis use.
"The authorities use the media to peddle their claims that marijuana is a gateway drug to harder substances, and the media are too stupid to check if what they are being told is true," he said.
Many Americans have tried it, quite a few like it, but the federal government insists that marijuana is a gateway to harder substances, and so it shouldn't be treated like alcohol.
It was cannabis at first but later harder substances, culminating in crack cocaine.
But much harder substances were used during the Woodstock era, which is still hailed as a golden age for music.
Experts say that the drugs available in California may affect how people transition from pills to harder substances.
The claim that marijuana use will tip people toward other, harder substances has long been pushed by drug warriors, despite a lack of factual basis.
Though marijuana is still classified as a Schedule I drug under federal law ― putting it on equal standing with heroin, ecstasy and other harder substances ― Attorney General William Barr has vowed to discontinue the crackdown his predecessor, Jeff Sessions, once pushed for.
She mobilized her neighbors and then the nation to crack down on a drug that she argued was damaging children's capacity to learn and acting as a "gateway" to "harder" substances.
Though he started using mephedrone for pleasure, it began to feature so regularly in his sex work that a recreational habit transformed into an addiction, not to mention a gateway to harder substances.
The PDFA didn't just brand drugs as lame, but actively dangerous, too; and just like Nancy Reagan's "Just Say No" campaign, the PDFA initially did little to distinguish between weed and harder substances such as cocaine or heroin.
